Watch Steve Ballmer’s day one keynote at the Worldwide Partner Conference 2013

Yesterday Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer provided the opening remarks at the Worldwide Partner Conference (WPC 2013) day one keynote, taking the opportunity to hype Windows 8.1 and sell the benefits of Windows Phone.

He started the half hour keynote by thanking the 15,000 attendees in the room for their support and for taking care of Microsoft’s customers, before getting on to the subject of the company’s divisive operating system.

"Windows 8 was nothing short of the most remarkable re-platforming of Windows, basically, since 1995", Ballmer said. "And we’ve gotten a lot of feedback on Windows 8. I think we did a heck of a good job on Windows 8 and we’re going to spend a lot of today also talking about Windows 8.1. Because we listened and we learned, and as good as Windows 8 is, I just encourage you to really take a look at the Windows 8.1 demo. It really speaks to the feedback we’ve gotten, it builds on the exciting new user interface, the abrasive new platform, the new programming model, but we’ve also digested the feedback that we’ve gotten, from people on how it works in the enterprise, what we need for serious desktop users, and I think you’ll be incredibly impressed by the work on Windows 8.1".

It’s always interesting to watch Steve Ballmer bullishly promoting Microsoft and you can catch up on his keynote in its entirety below.